Six HBKU Students Receive Research Grants from QNRF

Six graduate students from Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU) College of Science and Engineering (CSE) received awards from the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF), as part of the Graduate Student Research Award programme. With the funding, the six masteral and doctoral students will undertake projects in sustainable energy and environment, data science, the biomedical sciences and computer science.

The Graduate Student Research Award is presented under the QNRF Research Leadership Program, adding to HBKU’s growing research portfolio, which now pursues at least 80 different projects.

Dr Mounir Hamdi, Dean of the College of Science and Engineering said they are consistently and diligently committed to creating a rigorous academic culture.

Our researchers are constantly working on breakthrough discoveries and innovations, and I’m proud to be a part of this community of scholars and scientists. Together with my colleagues across HBKU, I feel inspired to remain steadfast in our mission to contribute towards Qatar’s knowledge-based economy, and these achievements make it all possible.’

The awardees comprised of four PhD and two masteral students from the College of Science and Engineering.

One of the winners of the QNRF grants is a doctoral candidate in computer science and engineering. Aboubakr Aqle has been awarded for his work on data-driven text summarisation technologies. Aqle’s research focuses on analysing large amounts of data, to draw patterns for text summarisation, touching on key computer science fields like web accessibility, UI/UX design, information and knowledge engineering, meta-search engine development, natural language processing and sentiment analysis. His work, supported by the grant, seeks to make significant impact on how users consume text online, and optimize summarization in text consumption, especially for content consumers who are visually impaired.

All HBKU programmes focus on research, and the University’s three research institutes Qatar Biomedical Research Institute (QBRI), Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI), and Qatar Environment and Energy Research Institute (QEERI)) each work within a unique field to carry out groundbreaking research that can benefit society.

Through research recognitions and grant opportunities, HBKU colleges and research institutes directly help address the grand challenges that are outlined in the Qatar National Research Strategy.

To learn more about research at HBKU, visit their website at hbku.edu.qa.